The Private Suite at KKH

Called on Mon 13 Mar to make the appt to see Dr SF Loh. He had very good reviews at the Motherhood forum for successful IVF cases. I was prepared to do IVF.

After being put on hold for ages, i was half expecting that the appt would be 3 weeks down the road (KKH efficiency) but was pleasantly surprised that there's an available slot that Wed evening. confirmed the appointment.

Was pretty impressed with TPS, the set up is so totally differnt from the normal clinics at KKH, for 6 bucks more, you get shorter waiting time, a beautiful and comfortable waiting area replete with magazines and hot drinks, a sms system that inform you of your appointments, the designated doctor that you want to see and super friendly nurses and service staff. overall impressed by the service rendered.

the doc was good, i;ve seen him before almost exactly a year back, this time round he didn't suggest IVF but to continue to try with clomid and IUI. He started me on metformin, 3 tabs of clomid and med to induce AF.

basically he put me on ovualtion monitoring at KKH IVF centre..and thats' where things start to go wrong.

When i called KKH IVF, i found out that they didn;t have a evening or a weekend clinic, the clinic which opens at 730am doesn't do scans till 8.30am and it takes approximately 1 hour waiitng time in the morning.

for ovulation monitoring, each cycle will need approx 3-5 scans, i cannot possible afford the down time from work. i am relunctant to take time off from work nor prepared to let my colleagues know about this yet.

enquiring further, I found out that besides the infelxibility in fixing appointments for scans, th scans are done by the sonographer on duty and the results reviewed by the team of doctors, not necessarily the designatd doctor.

the IUI procedure itself is also not necessarily done by the designated doc but by which ever doc who was on duty on that day. i wasn't prepared for that. the reason why i chose KKh was because of the good reviews about SF Loh, i trust his expertise not the rest of his team!

the last factor was cost. The package to do IUI at KKH IVF is not at any way subsided, which means one pay full price.

The scanning package is $300 for unlimited scans, urine tests at $15 per test (usually need about 3-4 tests), for IUI procedure which includes sperm washing (enhancement) and hcg jab cost another $300.

Before IUI can be done at KKH IVF, both parties need to go for blood tests to screen for AIDS, STD and rubella for the female, that will cost another $50 per pax plus $23 for the rubella test.

add together, the full package will cost about $780.

that sounds very expensive as compared to being done elsewhere or perhaps even in the private practice.

because i can't take that much time off from work, i got to look for other alternatives.

I thought of the CARE centre at paragon where we did the sperm washing for the last IUI, i remembered that they did IVF procedures as well, surely they do IUI as well.

and bingo they do. Their package comes to about $600 which includes everything above plus they do a additional scan at CD2 to rule out cysts. fantastic, this seems especially value for money, since they are able to scehdule the appointments before i start work or even during my lunch time. it helps that the centre was 10 min walk away from my working place.

according to the lady, each scan should take less than 30 min from stepping into the clinic to stepping out. thank goodness, indeed this is a lifeline. this would mean that i only need to take one day off which is on the day of the IUI itself.

Angela from the CARE centre was an absolute help. She suggested that since we were on 3 cycles of clmoid and still not preggy, we should consider other options. I would agree if the last IUI had not worked, but since it worked on clomid the last time round , i am willing to give it a try again, esp since i am now on metformin as well.

so currently my plan is as such

taking medicine to induce AF - for 10 days starting 15 Mar Wed
AF expected within 3 days
CD2-CD6 - 3 tabs of clomid

on CD2 to go to CARE for scan

total expenses so far
$90 for first time consult at the TPS
$42 for 3 months worth of metformin, clomid and folic acid (hoping that I donlt need 3 months of supply)

expected expenditure
$600 for CARE package